The government plans to fund TMC with around NT$30 billion (US$888.1 million) to rebuild its DRAM industry. DRAM makers on the island, with a few exceptions, have for years worked as contract chip factories, licensing memory chip technology from German, Japanese and U.S. companies, and producing chips as inexpensively as possible.

But the global recession has hit them at a bad time. A chip glut caused by building too many new factories and a resulting crash in chip prices nearly two years ago has been further exacerbated by a pull back in new lending and slowing demand in computers, the main market for DRAM.